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Venomous Lumpsucker

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About this listen

***Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award***
*SUNDAY TIMES SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL OF THE YEAR*

'A novel that delights, dazzles and moves in equal measure' Financial Times

'Brutally satirical and grimly hilarious' Daily Mail

The venomous lumpsucker is the most intelligent fish on the planet. Or maybe it was the most intelligent fish on the planet. Because it might have just gone extinct. Nobody knows. And nobody really cares, either. Except for two people.

Mining executive Mark Halyard has a prison cell waiting for him if that fish is gone for good, and biologist Karin Resaint needs it for her own darker purposes. They don't trust each other an inch, but they're left with no choice but to team up in search of the lumpsucker. And as they journey across the strange landscapes of near-future Europe - a nature reserve full of toxic waste; a floating city on the Baltic Sea; the lethal hinterlands of a totalitarian state - they're drawn into a conspiracy far bigger than one ugly little fish.

'A laugh-out-loud novel about mass extinction (yes, really)' Sunday Times

'Confirms his reputation as one of the foremost satirists of his generation' The Times

©2022 Ned Beauman (P)2022 Hodder & Stoughton Limited Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Literature & Fiction Science Fiction Thriller & Suspense Fiction Funny Witty
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Clever and engaging, this book may be satirical but sadly does not seem farfetched! Definitely funny and thought-provoking. Good audiobook version as well, the reader does accents for the different characters which is well-done and adds to the narration.

new favourite book

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Satire is a great tool for exploring the absurdities of existence and of society and for exposing truths we may otherwise find it hard to look at.

This book does that with its story based around Extinction Credits, a system that is oh so close to the truth and quite possibly something that will happen in the future. This morning alone I read about housing developers here in the UK being able to buy ‘nature restoration credits’ in exchange for not building nature friendly developments or building on green land. We know where this goes, not least down to books like this.

The book itself was very funny and good value until about 2/3s through. Then it ran a little off course, as I find satirical books usually do, when there main message is well spent. Still, very worth the read just to remind ourselves the sh*t we’re in and how we got there, and maybe how we can get out…

Enjoyable for the most part. Scarily close to truth.

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So many concepts and ideas handled with humour. This is a really important and informative book that opens a (hopefully not extinct) can of worms. It reminds me of Douglas Adams in many ways. Well written and constructed storytelling.

Wonderful.

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This was such an interesting book. The fantastic narration by John Hastings just pushed this book into such a fun, exciting and laugh out loud experience.
What an incredible take Ned Beauman had on the future and our dismissal on our surroundings.

Fun and interesting

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While I appreciate this is a good book I found I drifted off several times and just gave up listening half way through. I really wanted to like it more, many people did, so don't be put off by my words.

Not for me

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